Reviews and Notes

Summary/Annotation -> Colin Spencer provides an in-depth account of vegetarianism. From prehistory to the present, he discusses those who came to vegetarianism by choice, from the religions who preach it such as Hinduism and Seventh-Day Adventism, to the individuals who practice it, including Leonardo da Vinci and, ironically, Adolf Hitler. Throughout history, vegetarians have been maligned and persecuted by their meat-eating brethren. Spencer looks at the psychology of abstention, the ideas behind a meat-free diet, as well as the environmental effects of meat production and the implications of genetic engineering. Although the vegetarian movement dates back to 600 B.C., it is only now becoming a practice valued by many who previously would have wondered, "Where's the beef?"

$a George Bernard Shaw -- Wagner -- Croydon and the Simple Life -- Animal Welfare -- Tolstoy and the Dukhobors -- Gandhi and the Danielites -- The Flowering of the Ethic -- Sunlight and Sandals -- Poverty and War -- Criticism and Ridicule -- Raw Foods -- Hitler -- Between the Wars -- The Order of the Cross and Mazdaznanism -- The Second World War -- Sentient or Machine? -- The Counter-Culture -- Modern Farming -- Caring for the Environment -- The Concept of Pure Food -- Government Bungling -- Genetic Engineering -- Class -- The Reason Why -- The Future -- The Later History of Buddhism -- Manicheanism in China -- Modern Hinduism -- The Rise of the Vegetarian Cookery Book.

520

$a Spencer, author of several vegetarian cookbooks and British Food: An Extraordinary Thousand Years of History, aims to show societal factors leading to vegetarian creeds. He finds that it always involves pacifism and the questioning of established ideas and is usually met by some mega- dissing through mockery and antagonism. Thirteen chapters move chronologically from prehistory to Pythagoras to genetic engineering and organic farming. This is an important book, if for no other reason, than so few such histories have been written. This reprint of Vegetarianism (Grub Street, 2000), is itself a revision of the original publication, The Heretic's Feast (Fourth Estate, 1993). Annotation (c)2003 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)